Picture Mars - let us animate your ideas

Europe is going to Mars and we would like to see your ideas on how you imagine the Red Planet. The best images will be featured in an animation on the ESA website.

Mars has always held a fascination for us Earthlings. It is currently the only other planet in the solar system where scientists believe there is a possibility of finding life.

ESA’s Mars Express will be launched in June, arriving at Mars in time for Xmas. It will not alone – a flotilla of international spacecraft are destined to explore Mars in 2003/2004.

We would like to see your visual interpretation of Mars – it could be the planet as seen from Earth, what the lander might find on the surface, life on Mars, or your ideas for the future colonisation of the planet.

You can draw, paint or make a collage of pictures to present your idea of Mars. ESA will select and publish the best of these in a web animation. Images will be selected based on originality and graphic appeal. This invitation is open to all ages and nationalities – the only limit is your imagination!

How to submit a picture

If you would like to share your ideas with thousands of other ESA Portal visitors, just download the template below and present your artwork within the white circle.

Entry is by electronic mail only. Your image files should be sent to us as gifs or jpegs. Please do not send image files larger than 100 K.

Do not forget to include your name, address and your age if under 18*. Please provide a short description about the idea behind your image.

Remember - electronic mail only. Please do not send us original artwork by post; we will not be able to return it.

If your image is chosen, we will publish your name on the ESA Web Portal. Please note that ESA reserves the right to edit your image for the purpose of the animation.

*Copyright and protection of privacy

In contributing to the ESA Portal, the artist agrees to grant ESA a royalty-free, non-exclusive licence to publish artwork. Copyright remains with the originator of the artwork, but ESA reserves the right to edit the image for the purpose of the animation.

We request your name and address in case we need to contact you and to validate all entries. Any submissions without this information will be excluded. ESA strictly observes personal data privacy and does not sell or rent its website users' names, addresses, email addresses or other personal information.